How we make sense of the stories of our yesterday,
determines how we live our today.
To the degree that we make sense of the things that have happened in our life, we are able to experience a life that is rich and full of exciting things.
When we haven’t been able to make sense of the things that have happened to us, and we have had difficult things in the past, we are likely to be trapped and repeat those patterns. Whether it is neglect, abuse, emotional distance, or a multitude of other patterns, we are familiar with them, so we re-enact them in our adult lives. We are essentially powerless to the unfavorable hold they have in our current situations. The emotional distance we felt as a child….we feel it as a parent and spouse and friend. The pattern of unhealthy relationships we learned growing up….are repeated over and over in our adult relationships.
It is not until we make sense of our stories
that we can become free of their hold on us.
As we integrate our stories it literally changes our brain, allowing us to live our lives unplugged from the old patterns. When we see ourselves from the healed perspective of the story, we can finally engage with ourselves and others in new and healthy ways.
And this is a beautiful way of living. This is how you were meant to live. Empowered by your story, rather than imprisoned by it.
It is so incredibly hopeful to know that it is not just what happened to us that makes us who we are today, but it is through our ability to make sense of what happened to us that we become reshaped into the best and freest versions of ourselves.
What is your story? Does it make sense? Can you explain it easily?
I could not. I hardly remembered it, and certainly couldn’t put it in any meaningful order. The coherence of my narrative was intangable. My story was confusing, riddled with holes, and didn’t make sense to me. But onward I went. Or so I thought. Yes, I did life differently than those I fought hard to not be like. But the confusing, unintegrated, messy story still wound its web around me, impacting connections to my children, husband and friends.
Working through story changes everything. It has changed me. And that is why I bring Story Work into my coaching.
My favored way to do Story Work is in Group. We were often alone during the pain points of our stories, so bringing them into the connection and attunement of the others is powerful. Through processing the stories of our lives in this group coaching setting, we heal and are free to grow in new ways. We change our lives by bringing understanding and healing into our stories. We are then able to gain new relational experiences that mismatch what we had known. These new experiences replace the old with a healed view of ourselves and how we relate to others.
This is story work.
We begin to do things we never imagined! Feel ways we never thought possible! Become who we always hoped we could be. We begin to write our story instead of our story writing us.
These are some of the people who walked along side me in my story work. Let’s find your Coaching Group and begin story work today!
* To learn more about how our stories impact us, a few books I recommend are What Happened to You by Oprah Winfrey and Dr Bruce Perry and The Choice by Dr Edith Eger.